The Huskies started the season in Las Vegas, Nev., then tripped to Tempe, Ariz., and today find themselves in Albuquerque, N.M. They still haven’t played a home game.

“Going through security gets tedious,” said sophomore second baseman Bailey Stenson.

Such is life for the Washington softball team, which begins play in the Lobo Invitational today at 11:30 a.m. in New Mexico.

The Huskies (4-4-1) face Texas Tech and Missouri today, then play Wichita State and New Mexico tomorrow before bracket play begins Sunday.

“It’s hard playing on the road every weekend,” UW coach Heather Tarr said. “But when we recruit the student athletes, they know that’s what makes them strong.”

Speaking of which, this weekend presents another chance for the UW team to get healthy. Freshman pitcher Aleah Macon is still recovering from a sprained ankle, but her play recently hasn’t been indicative of that. Macon threw a no-hitter last weekend against Missouri-Kansas City in just her second career appearance, and struck out 10 batters in a relief effort against No. 3 Texas A&M.

“It’s expected of her as an athlete to be able to do that,” Tarr said of Macon’s relief appearance, in which she entered the game in the middle of the second inning and proceeded to strike out the side. “But it’s promising to know that she can come into that kind of situation and shut down a big-time team like that.”

While Macon and senior pitcher Caitlin Noble try to fill the void left by All-American junior Danielle Lawrie, who is spending this season competing for the Canadian National Team in the Beijing Olympics, it’s no secret that the Huskies are still trying to fill the shoes of last season’s big-time producers at the plate, namely Dena Tyson and Dominique Lastrapes.

Stenson, who has moved into the starting spot at second base this season that was vacated after Lastrapes graduated, has integrated into the team well thus far. She has started in all nine of the UW’s games this season, leads the team with 13 hits and is second on the squad with a .419 batting average.

But Stenson isn’t alone in her offensive production. The Huskies have scored 48 runs and pounded out 78 hits in their nine games this season, an average of more than five runs and just under nine hits per game.

“We have a really good offensive team,” Stenson said. “Our team has a lot of fun and we have a lot of talent. It’s just stringing all the facets of the game together that we need to do.”

Unlike in years past, Tarr said that heading into this season, it wasn’t necessarily apparent who would fill out the starting lineup

“We’ve usually had a more experienced group out of the gate,” Tarr said. “We’re still trying to find out who our best nine are. So we are working on some different things right now. We’re competing very well at the plate, but defensively we’re still working some different people in some different positions.”

The Huskies make their home debut next weekend, as they return to Seattle to host the Husky Softball Classic.

[Reach reporter Christian Caple at sports@thedaily.washington.edu.]